


Love Club

by floralshoppe



Category: South Park
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Coming of Age, F/F, I swear lol, Kyle Centric, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Slice of Life, Underage Drinking, kinda lol, mutual dumbasses
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-11
Updated: 2019-04-23
Packaged: 2019-10-22 09:38:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17660318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/floralshoppe/pseuds/floralshoppe
Summary: Senior year has just started, Kyle and Stan aren't on the best of terms, and there's a weird club that he can't stop digging his nose into.South Park must have really mellowed out over the years if this is what his biggest problems are in life.





	1. 1

Kyle wasn’t even sure if you were allowed to have a club with no description. Then again, Eric’s Anti-Hippie Association passed last year with the only description being ‘Fuck hippies. And Jews. But mostly hippies.’ Kyle felt his eye twitch at the memory(“It’s freedom of speech,” the principal had repeated to him for the Nth time in his life.)

Still, there was something weird about the Love Club, and something even more off about the fact that it already had four members. There weren’t any requirements to get in and it was open only to South Park’s senior class. If it wasn’t for the fact that it was run by Wendy Testaburger, South Park’s biggest overachiever, he’d assume it was one of those slackers clubs where you sit around and stare at the wall for two hours a week for extra credit.

“They’re probably in there being a bunch of gays and doing like...girlie shit. Like talking about their fucking feelings and pubes. Lame.” Kyle hated when he agreed with Eric.

“I’m in it.” The way it rolled off of Kenny’s tongue you’d’ve thought he’d said something totally normal. Kyle finally managed the pry his eyes off of the paper to focus on the real matter.

“You what.”

“I _said_ I’m already in it.” He took a big bite out of his sandwich, obviously uncaring of the rest of the table staring at him. “Butters is in it, too.”

“Who gives a fuck about Butters?” Eric started, ignoring the glare Kenny was sending his way. “Why the hell would you join a group called the Love Club? It’s like you _want_ to be called a fag.”

“It seems nice.” was Kenny’s chilled response, signaling the end of their conversation.

Kyle turned to Stan, who only looked at him with the same unsure expression and shrugged before turning back to his lunch. Of courseーleave it to him to be the only one interested in this. Maybe he wouldn’t join a club and get his extra credit some other way. It wasn’t like he didn’t have the smarts for it, but he wasn’t sure if he was up for another year of spending his afternoon studying himself to death with his dad checking over his shoulder every ten minutes. He would join the World Culture club where they eat foods from around the world and ‘learn’ about other countries, but Cartman was already signed up for that one. Getting high at the park and nearly dying of hypothermia with Stan sounded more appealing at this point.

The sounding of the bell signaled lunch being over, and Kyle did his best to put his mind on literally anything else.

As it turns out, there wasn’t anything else for Kyle to waste his time thinking about. It was only the beginning of the school year anyway. There were only so many freshmen to make fun of before it got boring. Like always, he found himself half taking notes and half thinking about anything else, only being jolted out of it every so often to listen to one of Cartman’s shitty jokes. Maybe it was a bit presumptuous, but this was starting to seem like the lamest senior year in the history of senior years. The idea that nothing had changed at all but the grade level itself sent shivers down his spine. He ignored Stan’s concerned side glance, burying his head deeper into his notes until the eventual ring of the bell had him nearly racing to get out of the room.

And of course he had to have passed by all the clubs gathering. He peered around the schoolyard, desperate to find that familiar splotch of blue. “This is stupid.”

“What is?” The sound of Butters’ excited voice made him turn so fast his vision swam.

“Oh my god, dude! Don’t sneak up on me like that!”

“Sorry! I was just trying to figure out what you were staring down the campus for.”

Kyle groaned. Even Butters thought he looked fucking stupid. “It’s nothing. I was just looking for someone, I guess.”

“Oh! Well, mind if I join ya?”

Kyle raised any eyebrow, already growing weary of the constant happy expression Butters wore. “Don’t you have club meetings today?”

Butters did that thing where he started fiddling his thumbs back and forth. “W-Well yeah, but our club meets at different times than the other clubs to make things more secret and all. That’s what Bebe says.”  
  
His mind reeled, baseball long forgotten as he sat on the sidewalkーand wow, he never thought he’d be so desperate for entertainment that he’d consider skipping practice just to listen to _Butters fucking Stotch_. Still, there was an 100% chance that no one else in the club was spilling anything. This was the closest to an explanation he was ever going to get.

“Bebe’s in your club?”

“Yeah! Wendy too...I really don’t think I’m supposed to be telling you all this but...I don’t know, It’s not like you talk to anyone except Stan anyway.”

Kyle decided to ignore the massive blow to his ego(because honestly, it’s not like he was lying), and instead decided to just keep milking Butters to the best of his ability. “Why are you guys being so secretive anyway? It’s not like anyone’s gonna notice or anything.”

Kyle tried to look as uninterested as possible, but he couldn’t help but to sneak hopeful glances up at Butters. Butters, whose attention was turned to something behind them, and before he could even bother to askー.

“Kenny! Boy am I glad to see you.” Kyle felt a twinge of guilt at the undeniable relief in the boy’s voice. Maybe he was being a bit more pushy than was needed, especially to someone already as easily swayed as Butters. That didn’t stop him from throwing an annoyed look Kenny’s way.

“Hey Kenny.” he grumbled, picking up his equipment. Fuck practice. “Do you know where Stan is? I was kind of looking for him.” He avoided eye contact, not willing to see the accusing look on either of their faces.

“By the bleachers, dude.” And okay, yeah, _he got it_ ーStan was always by the bleachers after school, he should know that better than anyone, and his attempt to escape was bullshit. Whatever.

“I’ll see you guys later.” he rushed, half jogging across the field like an idiot.

As was predicted, Stan was huddled at the very top of the bleachers, watching out over the multiple sports teams getting ready for practice.

He rapped his knuckles against the metal rail, trying to catch his attention without the coach seeing him. He watched as Stan leaned over to look down at him. “Hey dude.”

“Hey. You wanna go to Harbucks?”

“Don’t you have practice?”

“That’s why I’m hiding, Marsh.”

Stan rolled his eyes but made his way down the steps. “Don’t go all last name on me, _Broflovski_.”

Kyle snorted, waiting until he got to the last step to shove him in the shoulder.

 

The inside of the coffee shop was way too warm and cozy for how uncomfortable he felt on the inside. Stan clearly noticed itー _of course he did_ ーbut made no move to comment on it. And why did that feel like a metaphor for his life right now? He hated that, and he hated the abandoned motion he made to get his phone and tweet it.

“Kyle dude, seriously, what’s up? You’ve been acting all weird since homeroom.”

“Do you know what club you’re joining?” Kyle fiddles with the steadily cooling cup of tea in his hands, both the drink and the cheap croissant abandoned and messed over in front of him.

Stan raised an eyebrow, reaching in his pocket for his flask. Kyle watched with pursed lips as he poured an unreasonable amount of whatever liquor he had that day into his coffee before continuing the conversation. “I heard this semester’s film club is watching only Quentin Tarantino movies. You just have to watch it and write a two paragraph review for each one.” Again, the boy paused to take a concerningly large gulp of his drink, eyes coming back glassy and only slightly ashamed. If it was anyone else he’d probably be going out of his way to hide his drinking, but for Kyle that only made him more frustrated.

“I’m not carrying you home, Stan. Watch it.”

Stan grumbled something incoherent, his cheeks glowing the faintest red in a way that made Kyle’s forehead smooth and his shoulders drop. “I’m just saying. It looks like a pretty easy A. I think Clyde’s signed up for that one, though. I’m not sure I can handle him crying and every girl in class fawning over him.”

Kyle snorted, the image of Clyde being his usual overly sensitive self while a bunch of freshman girls lose their shit wasn’t that hard to see.

“What about you, man? You’re already playing a sport, do you really wanna give away more of your free time?”

“Dude, you do realize my free time is either catching up on sleep or catching frostbite with you, right?”

Stan rolled his eyes. “Stop being so overdramatic. That was one time, and I only lost feeling in my hands for like, a week.”

“You should take care of yourself more.” Kyle blurted before he could stop himself. Already he could see the way Stan’s shoulders bunched up, ready to argue back with all the denial in him.

“I do take care of myself. Not all of us spend all our time worrying about getting into the best college and the most extra credit. You’re the one who barely gets any sleepー”

“Stan, stopー”

Stan slammed his hands against the coffee table, nearly knocking everything over as he stood up. “No Kyle, fuck off. Stop treating me like I’m a burnoutー”

“Iー”

“I’m going home. I’ll talk to you later or whatever.”

Kyle groaned with frustration, watching his best friend stumble before collecting himself and storming out of the coffee shop, not so much as giving a single glance behind him. He pushed his plate forward, giving himself room to smash his head against the cool wooden table.

_Way to go, Kyle. You’ve pissed him off for the thousandth time in your life._

 

 

The walk home was bitter and unforgiving, the air getting more dreary and windy by the minute. Between the feeling of cold snow sloshing and melting away in his socks and getting pistol whipped by the harsh snow blowing in his face, stepping into the welcoming heat of his house was easily the silver lining of the day. He toed his shoes off, not even bothering to move them out of the way before power-walking to his room, dropping all his school stuff like it was burning him alive. Only after he’d stripped down to just his boxers and shirt and sat in front of his computer did he finally breathe the biggest sigh of relief.

If today was anything to go by, this school year was going to be the biggest bitch of his life.

 

**@YouMeAtStan tweeted:** wish ppl would just let me live my life lol

**@yourboieric replied:** did kyle not want to get drunk with you ://

**@YouMeAtStan replied:** go to hell cartman

**@yourboieric replied:** you know cyberbullying is illegal right :// i should report you for this

Kyle glowered at his screen, running a hand through his already mussed hair. He could hear his phone vibrating with what had to be texts from the baseball team, so he’d taken to focusing in on only his computer screen.

Downstairs he could hear his parents complain about his shoes blocking the doorway, his mom’s squeaking voice making even him flinch.

 

**@itskylebro sent @YouMeAtStan a direct message** : hey  
**stan m:** sup  
**k y l e:** are you still mad at me  
**stan m:** no  
**k y l e:** ok  
**k y l e:** are you sure  
**stan m:** im going to block u  
**k y l e:** okay sorry  
**stan m:** dued  
**stan m:** dude  
**stan m:** shut up  
**stan m:** if i was mad iwouldnt be talking to u  
**stan m:** ur just a dick sometimes whatvr im over it  
**k y l e:** :(  
**stan m:** oh my god im logging out  
**stan m:** im srs dude talk to me when ur not trying to be my therapist k thx  
**k y l e:** i don’t wanna be your therapist i want to be your friend

After ten minutes of no response Kyle threw his head back in annoyance. He wasn’t that overbearing, right? When he thought of overbearing he thought of his mom monitoring and starting petitions against everything he liked, or Butters’ parents grounding him at least once a month since middle school.

Kyle kicked at his wooden desk, focusing on the jolt of pain that shot through his foot. There where so many thoughts shooting through his mind and he didn’t want to focus on any of them.

 


	2. 2

The next morning Kyle could still feel his right foot pounding from the unnecessary beating. The angry beeping of his alarm ignited his fight or flight response and in a moment of pure weakness he found himself staring at the bleary screen in front of him.

 

_4 missed calls_

_3 voicemails_

_30 unread messages_

_Sheila Broflovski sent you a request on Candy Crush Saga_

 

His eyes roamed against his will, searching and failing to find the name he was looking for. He dropped his phone back to his dresser and forced himself to focus on other important things, like showering and cereal and emptying his bladder and _holy shit_.

He was all gangly pale limbs lost in bed sheets for a solid minute before he had both feet slammed on the icy floor and stomping through the hallway. Kyle never considered himself as someone who gave up. When something bothered him, he had to work at it until there was nothing left or it burned wildly out of proportion. Being stuck inside a grey area made his insides twist against each other like he was suddenly in middle school and there were all these questions floating around his head with no one to answer. If he tried to explain to his parents, he’d undoubtedly find himself the brand new owner of _Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul_ ーvolumes 1, 2, and 3.

Kenny was a great friend to vent to, mainly for his constantly laid back attitude, but his solutions ranged from ‘ _Just smoke a bowl and order takeout, you’ll be fine,_ ’ to _‘Stop being stupid and sort out your feelings before you throw them at everyone else._ ’ Kyle wasn’t particularly yearning for either option at the moment. He wasn’t one to give up, but he _definitely_ wasn’t someone to give in. The prospect of even beginning to accept being wrong made the back of his throat tickle, a bundle of words that he held back like a cough. He let his other choices float through his mind, even as the wet heat of the shower drummed at his shoulders and made his hair fall and curl against his neck. Cartman was 100% out of the question, and Kyle considered that with only the tiniest twinge of regret. The worst thing about Eric Cartman and probably the defining point of their relationshipーbesides the constant anti-semitism and nonexistent moralsーtethered on the major fact that, in a lot of cases, he actually agreed with him.

The thought made his teeth grit, barely noticing the gross soapy water that slid into his mouth. No matter how much he hated it, Cartman usually brought up a great point, or if it was stupid and shitty he argued them so well it was hard not to consider it. The big difference was that Kyle actually had a moral high-ground. When he had a problem, he wanted to solve it in a way that saved everyone from getting hurt, solving it carefully so that there was never any scar tissue.

Cartman on the other hand had enough resolve to slip through a brick wall with not a hair out of place.

It was Kyle’s mother’s shrill voice that broke into his train of thought and forced him to shut off the faucet along with the rest of thoughts.

 

 

 

The lack of air that exists inside a crowded school bus makes Kyle feel like he’s going to suffocate half to death. The over-excited movement of freshmen who hadn’t lost their willpower versus the low waves of junior and senior voices washed over his senses like a murky, shitty storm. Pressing his forehead into the cold ripped seat in front of him and zoning out was like the equally shitty but still helpful lifeguard.

So obviously, the way Stan is laid out on their row with his feet hanging in the aisle makes him the shitty passenger that protects himself over everything long before glancing at the bigger picture that exists far beyond the shitty storm. Kyle carries this metaphor into his glare that Stan’s closed, obvious hungover eyelids block out with not so much as a flutter. Turning to the seat behind him, he meets Kenny’s bored but sympathetic gaze, and then the space he left open beside him. Kyle thinks this is why everyone is friends with Kenny. Kenny doesn’t lean one way more than the other, he doesn’t base his opinion around other people’s opinions. Kenny likes his sister, Butters, weed, and his friends, in that exact order. Everything else sort of flickered.

“Have I told you that I loved you lately?”

“I don’t think you’ve ever told me that.”

Kyle pressed his head hard into the seat, all the breath leaving his body as he sat down. “Dude, I fucking love you.”

Kenny snorted, kicking the other boy in the shin. “Is Stan making you sleep on the couch now?”

He turned his glare to his friend’s shit eating grin. “Actually, I take it back. I hate you.”

“That’s sweet. Are you gonna tell me what’s burning you up or am I gonna have to keep pestering it out of you?”

What Kyle wants to say is, ‘ _Fuck off, I’m fine, there’s no fire in my chest or war in Ba Sing Se._ ’ Instead, he just chokes on his tongue in a way that leaves his mouth gaping before the words slip out on their own.

“Am I overbearing?”

Kenny gives him a look that’s impossible to read. Half of him looked surprised that Kyle wasn’t shooting back something defensive, and the other half exasperated because Kyle definitely knew the answer to that.

“Who said that?”

“I dunno. I just sorta put the pieces together.”

Kenny hummed against the fur of his jacket. For some reason it gave Kyle this sinking feeling he wasn’t gonna like the answer.

“You’re not overbearing.”

“I’m not?”

“No.”

Kyle doesn’t get a chance to enjoy the rock that’s lifted from his chest, barely gets to enjoy the air that fills his lungs, before Kenny’s already picking up another one, just as loaded and heavy.

“You’re overlooking. If you get an answer you don’t like, you look somewhere else or you make up your own.” Kenny gives him a tiny, shifting smile as he places the new rock right on his chest with a hard thump.

Kyle stares ahead, his ears just making out the soft snores coming from the seat in front of him. He’s not really sure why he’s suddenly shocked that Kenny, who seemed to have an answer for most things at the back of his hand, had him figured out. In fact, he’s not sure why the entire school hasn’t had him figured out; everything about him was red, from his hair to his freckles to his hands. Stan is nothing like him, and that’s his favorite thing. Kyle never needed to answer because Stan never faltered to do it for him. Stan wasn’t afraid of the truth, he just hated it.

What was Kyle supposed to do with that?

He licked his lips, his teeth clicking together as he blinked himself from those thoughts. They were at school, and Kenny was digging his foot into the front seat until Stan woke up with a hard groan and was slowly shifting his weight to lean against the frosted window. There was no mistaking the harsh bruises of insomnia under his eyes, and for a split second there was a soft, tired glint in his eyes that made Kyle’s entire chest spasm.

“Dude, did I sleep the whole ride?” Stan’s question is obviously directed at him, but his eyes only pause on his, barely focusing before turning somewhere else.

“Yeah asshole. You took the whole seat up too, so I had to bunk with Kenny.” It’s meant to be a playful harsh in the same way that Stan’s laugh is supposed to be easy and careless, but the tension is too tight around his diaphragm to make it anything but awkward. From the corner of his vision he can see Kenny roll his eyes, staring at the scene he had to bare witness to like he’d been stuck behind a red light for five minutes with no chance of moving forward.

 

 

 

 _Write a poem to describe your feelings for the new school year._ That’s the assignment Kyle’s been staring down at for the past five minutes. He’ll admit, poetry had never been his strong point. It always seemed too overdramatic, too hidden in metaphors for anyone who wasn’t the author to truly understand. At least in math everything’s given to you. Math never asked for his opinion on death or love or the scent of flowers in the morning.

According to their English teacher whose name he already forgot, they’d be doing this the first of every month, and then an analysis of it at the end of the month. There was definitely some kind of vague important reasoning for doing it, but right then it only served to give Kyle what felt like the beginnings of a headache.

As of now the only thing written on the paper was his name, _AUGUST_ in big cursive letters, and a bad first attempt that rhymed shit with itself three times and ended with an entire stanza dedicated to subtweets. Honestly, he deserved an A.

He glared up at the clock(because what else is there to do on the first week of school besides that and fill out the academic version of personality tests), the last ten minutes of class taunting him in a way that made him want to add another stanza to really show his distaste. He turned his gaze to Kenny, and of course his face was squished into his desk, jacket pulled back for just the right amount of neck support that would let him drift off. Directly behind him, Kyle could just make out Wendy’s perfect cursive, page full of words that probably had actual merit to it. The girl was currently tapping her pen against her notebook, glare settling right between Kenny’s shoulder blades. Kyle thinks it’s a great thing that their sort of mini-rivalry spared him from ever having to sit through one of her lectures on being a responsible student. Memories of him walking in on her talking to Stan flooded his memory.

Unlike with Kyle, Stan actually felt bad for being an ass to Wendy. Instead of shoving her away with a hard stare and a shove to the shoulder, he’d sit there and let her run her fingers over his bruised knuckles. Kyle can still hear Wendy's high soft voice, the way that she could probably careen the ocean if it let her. He can still remember staring at his own reflection in the mirror, listening to his own voice, comparing them the way he'd compare any other notes, trying to find out what made them so different, what made her so much better.

Wendy broke up with Stan the next week, right before the start of summer vacation. Kyle felt the memory of stick between his teeth in way that made his heart feel like it was shaking his bones apart.

He sucked a breath through his teeth and grabbed for his pencil, drawing a big 'X' over the original poem and trying again, the two minutes left of class looming over him like a challenge.

 _i don't want to compare myself anymore_  
i don't like noticing the difference  
between black and red  
it's making my head real sore  
  
  
Kyle scoffed at his own bad writing, crossing over it and starting over.

 _i'm not red_  
_i'm not overbearing_  
_i'm not overlooking_  
_i'm not fucking staring_

Cross.

 _roses are red_  
_violets are blue_  
_poetry is stupid_  
_i am too_

The buzzing of the bell makes Kyle flinch and he ends up tearing a hole right through the middle of the paper. He slammed his fist on the table, making Kenny's head shoot up with his blank paper stuck comically to the side of his face.

In one last attempt, Kyle smooths out the paper, writes one last line, and shoves it underneath all the rest of the assignments on the way out.

 _even if_  
_i'm not the first_  
_choice you pick_  
_am i really so much worse_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> new chapter already waw! i'm having rly fun writing this so i hope you enjoy !!  
> *not proofread, so sorry for any errors


	3. 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another short chapter oops...but the next one should be up in a day or two so be ready lol
> 
> not proofread

Lunch was barely an event. It’s like when you go to see a movie you know will be shitty so that you can make fun of it and eat popcorn. Except that it was lunch so instead of overpriced popcorn and candy it was sloppy Joe’s and overly ripe bananas.

Kyle had barely sat down in his seat before he was already shoving the sandwich in his mouth, quick to focus on but poetry. He spared a glance up, glad to see everyone else was either still in line or not in the cafeteria yet. He didn’t think he could make his brain put up with any more judging today without him saying something stupid. He glared down at his plate, hearing his leg rattle the entire table with how much it shook. It was annoying how every time he thought about that week and everything that had followed his entire body went into panic mode. The lump in his chest made it feel like he was swallowing rocks. He forced half his water down his throat, trying not to think about how gross he must’ve looked from the outside shoving food in his mouth like he’d gone feral.

_This must be what Cartman feels like_ he thought, willing himself to actually chew his food.

He focused instead on speculating the room around him, ears perking as he caught sight of  Butters and Bebe talking alone at the table next to him. For a split second he considered sliding his plate across the table and scooting over for the Ultimate Listening Experience™. _That’s just_ begging _for a fight._ He couldn’t even thump his foot against the metal legs without thinking about how much it had hurt he night before. Whoever had a the voodoo doll for his life was definitely having fun fucking him over.

“That’s the thing Butters. We only need one more person, but it can’t just be anyone. Like, you wouldn’t trust Scott Malkinson with club materials, right?”

Butters had a serious look his face(which, considering it was Butters, was more of a pout than anything). Eventually, he let out a little ‘a-ha’ noise, that weird mischievous sound tone building in his voice. “So you’re saying we need someone who doesn’t just fit the description, but someone that can keep a little secret too.”

“Exactly, Leo.” Bebe’s face scrunched at the sandwich in front of her, as if she was contemplating if was really worth having to re-apply her lipstick for.

“How come you don’t just ask Wendy?”

“Wellー”

“Dude, Clyde’s glaring at you like you just straight up pissed in his mouth.”

Kyle startled, shocked eyes taking a moment to register Stan settling down beside him. He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t nervous. His tongue felt like sandpaper trying to put together some kind of sentence that wouldn’t make him sound as completely lost as he felt. A small, aborted laugh eventually escaped his lips. “It’s probably because I skipped practice on the first day of school.”

“That and the way you were staring at Bebe like she was giving the secrets to the universe.”

Kyle glared at the boy next to him as he stabbed around his plate with his fork. “I just can’t stop thinking about that dumbass club they’re in.” he grumbled, not even noticing he was back to aggressively food shoveling until he caught the dumb grin on Stan’s face. He let out a gross muffled noise that could vaguely resemble a _‘what_?’

“You look like really angry chipmunk.” Stan’s wide grin caught Kyle between wanting to glare even harder and trying to keep the flush from showing on his face. Most of all he had to hide the relieved glint in his eyes, or the way his shoulders felt like someone had finally unpinned them and let the joints move freely. Really, where were these big dumb metaphors when he was struggling to come up with a word to rhyme with red?

“Fuck you, dude.” he said around a giant gulp of water, eyes catching on the vibrant orange sun that was Kenny, always there to save him when he was about to do something stupid. “Kenny! You’re in that club, right?”

For the second time that day he was put under the spotlight of a famous Kenny Look, this particular one involving a lot of eye squinting and a suspicious up-and-down. He lowered himself to the table like he was walking into a death trap.

“Which one?”

“The one with Bebe and Butters. Don’t you need four people to start a club anyway?” Stan’s laid-back way of asking about things was so confusing it was almost nerve-wracking. He could get everyone else what they needed with an almost endearing amount of selflessness, but ask him if he needs help? Suddenly it was like you’d committed the worst crime imaginable. Kyle wasn’t aware how much pent up bitterness he had inside him until he felt Kenny’s boot kicking him at his own and _wow_ , he’d really just snapped a plastic spork out of his weird, selfish emotions. Maybe he’d gone feral.

Kennyーwho Kyle at this point owed his first born childーsegued the entire conversation, making some dumb joke like ‘ _the spork is me when it’s only the second day of school and I have homework_.’ Stan had a casually concerned look on his face, like he wanted to know the problem but would be perfectly fine if Kyle never explained. That’s probably what bothered him so muchーthe complete lack of interest in anything and everything.

It wasn’t Stan’s fault obviously, Kyle knew that he had problems with pretending to be half as excited for things as everyone else, the awkward half smile he would give always twinged with sadness and never meeting his eyes.

“Kyle, come look for Cartman with me.”

“Huh? Whatーno?” The words couldn’t stutter out of his mouth fast enough, peering over the fastened grip of Kenny’s arm to look back at Stan who, as expected, only frowned slightly harder before turning back to his sandwich.

“If you go into another internal existential conflict I swear to  _God_ I’m not talking to you for the rest of the week.” Kenny pinched his arm hard enough to bruise. “I’m never telling you the truth again, I fucking swear. Next time I’m just gonna leave you little sticky notes and a bunny trail and hope for the best.”

Kyle growled as Kenny wrapped an arm around his shoulder, the uncomfortable weight mixed with the sore skin it kept brushing against making for an easy distraction. “This is so annoying.” he mumbled. The empty halls always served as an oddly serene place to be, the perfect amount of silence and just enough space to breathe with feeling agoraphobic. He could walk back and forth all lunch if he wanted and feel like he’d just gone on a nature walk.

“You’re overthinking. Which is like, definitely my fault for throwing that on you before 8 a.m. by the way, so sorry for that.”

“Why am I ‘over’ everything?”

“Natural Jewish tendencies?” Kenny grunted at the sharp elbow digging into his rib. “Dude, kidding!”

It was actually scary how easily Kenny could switch from being the best friend to the douchebag he’s been hanging out with since kindergarten.

“Are we really gonna spend the rest of lunch looking for Cartman?”

“Nah. But it’d be sus if we didn’t at least pretend to look.”

They walked in silence for a few more minutes, the monotonous stomping of their shoes providing perfect background noise to help Kyle release the tautt hold of nerves in his shoulders.

It took him a couple more seconds of enjoying the peace before finally breaking the silence. “I really do wanna know about the Love Club. Stan wasn’t like, kidding or anything.”

“I know.”

Kyle tried to keep the dumbfounded look from his face, focusing instead on keeping up the pace. “Oh yeah?”

“You have the crappiest poker face I’ve ever seen. If you wanted to know all you had to do was ask, dude.” Kenny threw him a knowing lookーand like, really, how many different facial expressions can someone with half their face covered up even _have_. Still Kyle bit his tongue, desperate for this tiny piece of information “You already know who’s in the club by now. We still need one or two more people before the end of the month or we’re getting shut down.”

“So why don’t you add any?”

“You wanna join?”

“Huh? What! No!” Kyle’s foot practically rammed itself in his mouth. The blush on his face spread down his neck like a waterfall of embarrassment and bad decisions. “I don’t want to join any club! That’s ridiculous. I just. The name? And it was interesting cause it was blank, so yeah.”

He didn’t even notice they’d stop walkingーand woah, nostalgia, he hadn’t been down this hall since freshman year, what the _fuck_ ーuntil he realized they were both giving each other the blankest of stares. He could feel the eyes of an entire 9th grade class burning at his back.

“Kyle Broflovski, you are one dumb motherfucker.”


	4. 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hjnvfkdshb ...hi s0rry this took so long i couldn't figure out how to end this part and i still feel iffy about it but i hope you'll enjoy it anyway!!! sorry for any spelling or grammatical errors as always <3

 

The last few hours of school were spent in a weird place. P.E class was an awkward event of getting harsh glares from the rest of the baseball team as if somewhere along the line they actually began to care about being a good team. Any time Clyde even looked like he was heading his way, he started building a little speech in his head, ready to give a big dramatic paragraph about his hatred of most sports that would end with handing in his uniform. Fall Out Boy would play quietly in his head for the exit.

It wasn’t until everyone was deep in doing laps around the gym did the sneak attack finally happen, Clyde’s fake tough voice already putting a grimace on his face. “You think you can just get away with not showing up to practice or something?”

Kyle rolled his eyes, wishing there was a way to just mentally shove Clyde’s entire existence out of the way while he had mental psychological films in his head. “It’s not really a big deal.” he grumbledーwhich, okay, _wow_ , so much for staying on script and sticking it to the man. Definitely _not_ avoiding the main subject. _Totally not_ prolonging the argument.

Clyde’s incoherent sputtering was the closest thing to someone actually physically choking on words. “‘Not important?’ Are you serious right now? This is the last high school baseball season of our _lives_. We’ll never be in this good of a shape again!” Clyde side-stepped in front of him, backing up the conga line of people behind them on their phones and efficiently getting them cursed out. There’s not enough time to protest or apologize before Clyde’s grabbing him by the shoulders and shaking him back into his tirade. “I don’t know about you dude, but I don’t wanna be 50 with a beer gut and talking about old times while watching baseball highlights! We gotta do that shit now!” The way Clyde’s voice started breaking was a sure sign the tears were about to swell up.

Kyle’s face was stuck in a grimace, the dilemma of wanting to comfort Clyde so he could stop crying for five seconds while also just wanting to get the band-aid off running marathons around his head. “Clyde, Iー”

“Shut up, Kyle. I know you don’t want to be on the baseball team, okay?” Clyde finally let go of his grip, poking him in the shoulder only half-heartedly. The atmosphere was so weirdly bittersweet, compared to the whirlwind of emotions that were swinging only seconds earlier. “You’ve never been interested in baseball. It’s...whatever, dude. It just sucks losing another brother. I thought we’d at least stick around until college or something.” Again, before Kyle could even catch his train of thought enough to respond, Clyde was already coughing awkwardly and wiping the barely shed tears of his face. The splotchy redness of his face made the rock sitting on top of Kyle’s chest suddenly feel like an entire mountain. For how long the two had known each other, Kyle felt almost guilty for only just now remembering that Clyde was more than just a crybaby and a jock. Clyde had put all his heart into playing baseball since middle school, his entire room looked like a museum. Even back then he would get overly passionate about the team, going on for days when they’d won a game 3-0 once.

For Clyde it was the most important thing to him, and Kyle had been treating it like garbage.

There was a heavy pause as both of them decided what to do before Kyle gave in, nudging Clyde on the shoulder with no real force behind it. “I’ll still come to your games, Clyde. Whatever happened to frenemies and all that stuff?” It definitely wasn’t the most clever thing he could’ve said, but at the moment he really just wanted to stop hearing the blood rush around his head like a shame tsunami. It wasn’t like a movie where he suddenly picked up on his dick-ish tendencies and suddenly became whatever the antithesis of ‘passive aggressive nightmare.’ He still only managed to give some shitty half smile and wallow in the shared knowledge that this was the closest to expressing feelings either of them would ever get.

The whistle hadn’t even finished blowing before the both of them were already running past each other to be anywhere but this _fucking situation_.

The tangled knot followed him all the way to the lockers, hands fumbling over his clothes like his entire body had just done a system reboot. He barely had his shirt over his head before he was making a dash for the exit where he was met with a vaguely amused Stan.

“Kyle, what the fuck are you doing?”

“I’m skipping next class as a form of self-care.” he huffed, just barely keeping his breath steady. Stan rose an eyebrow in disbelief. “I skip classes too, you know. You and Kenny aren’t the only cool kids around here.”

“The fact that you think only cool kids skip class leads me to think differently.” Kyle hated the almost chiding tone of his voice. It wasn’t as if he’d never played hooky or anything, he just _preferred_ not to. And just because he was a little late sometimes on what is and isn’t cool didn’t mean anything either. Before he could voice any of this, Stan was already walking off, going into a story about something that happened during free period. It was almost impressive how Stan could annoy him in the exact same way, whether he was awake or not. It was bordering a talent.

By the time they’d made it to his house, Stan had given an entire rundown of the day with an unreasonable amount of detail. When they were setting up the game and he was still going on about the importance of the Louisiana Purchase, Kyle has to put an end to it.

“Dude, no offense but what the fuck are you talking about?”

Like he was being pulled out of a trance, he blinked, his cheeks turning red.

“Sorry, I was just—yeah.” was his decidedly non-explanation. This was always the part where Kyle supposedly said something unnecessary and ‘ruined the mood.’ It was hard not to like this, like someone was getting mad at him for acknowledging an elephant in the room.

Not wanting to go down that path, he just mumbled a ‘right’ and plopped down on the bed, fumbling to get his jacket off. Stan slowly started to finish his anecdote, white-knuckling the controllers in his hand until Kyle pried his away.

“Stan.” Kyle finally said, and i said something about the current state of their friendship that both of them cringed, like they’d both had a shared moment of clairvoyance. “I don’tーI don’t know what’s wrong or if there’s anything wrong at _all_ but you’re making me worried so if you could please just give me one fucking solid explanation I swear to God I won’t bring it up again. Just answer me his once, please?”

It was a problem that Kyle was glad to see Stan surprised and anxious, that he was that desperate for anything other than a simple, perfectly blank stare.

“You know how back in elementary school I would get so nervous I’d vomit everywhere?” Stan picked at a loose strand coming from his jeans. “I think my new version of that is just rambling. Every time I’m sober I just feel like talking for hours.”

The words took a few seconds to register, softly sinking in with a resounding ‘oh.’ “So right now, you’re likeー”

“Not drunk and gross? Yes. Pick a character.” Kyle looked up at the screen to see Stan was already waiting on him, some Nintendo character picked that he couldn’t be bothered to remember the name of. He chose the first character that caught his eyeーsome blue haired anime guy that looked like Stan during his scene phaseーwhile the other boy continued talking. “I was gonna skip class and maybe get a tiny little buzz, and then I thoughtーdude, the game’s starting, stop looking at me like thatーI thought, ‘Wow there’s my favorite friend in the world Kyle, if anyone can stop me from making poor life decisions it’s him.’ So ya know, here we are.”

Kyle wondered if this was a tactic to make sure neither of them ever spoke again. At the moment his brain was bordering on overheating, not sure whether to focus on the game that he was definitely losing, the part of their friendship the might finally be regaining, or the multiple realizations that seemed to be just raining on him that day. He wasn't really sure if there was anything to say that wouldn't make it completely obvious his last few braincells were completely fried. His talk was suddenly limited to mumbled insults when he lost and some very rare shouts of victory before their fingers had finally cramped up too much to keep playing and they were completely starving. Stan dashed down the stairs for the fridge, practically yanking out all the ingredients to make a sandwich.

Kyle slowly followed after him, opting for a bag of chips he'd found stuffed in his school bag.

"Thanks for not freaking out on me or anything." Stan said, eyes trained on his sandwich.

"There wasn't anything to say anyway. And I guess I said wouldn't bother you about it again, so it was just me keeping my promise."

Stan made an aborted noise in the back of his throat, like he couldn't figure out if he actually wanted to say any of the words that were getting stuck in his throat, before giving up and glaring at his plate like it'd stolen the words from him. "I don't want you to stop talking. Justーstop trying to psychoanalyze answers out of me and just _ask_ , dude. You always want me to talk but you neverーforget it." He tore the sandwich in halves and shoved a piece in his mouth. "This is bullshit."

_No kidding._ "Kenny said I overthink-"

"He's right."

"-and sometimes I don't think I actually even want the answer-"

"Probably not."

"-but if you want toーto talk or whatever, especially if it keeps you from drinking, you can do that. Or something."

"Yea."

Kyle sighed, the tiniest exhale of relief. "Yea. Now give me the other half of your sandwich, I'm fucking hungry."

**Author's Note:**

> waw ! my first serious writing in a while + my first sp fic too!!! i hope you all enjoy and sorry it's so short ;_;
> 
> as always, apologies for any spelling errors or grammatical incorrectness


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